BOSTON — While the Bruins prepared for their final game before the All-Star break against Florida on Wednesday, center Marc Savard already returned home to Ontario as he recovers from another concussion suffered on Saturday.
"He's gone back home," Bruins coach Claude Julien said after the morning skate. "He's gone there to rest, and that's all you can do when you've got a concussion. We'll take it from there. I don't think there's any daily report we can give more than we've got to give him some time."
Savard suffered a moderate concussion on Saturday in Colorado when his head hit the boards on a hit from former teammate Matt Hunwick. This injury comes on the heels of the concussion Savard suffered last March 7 on a blind-side cheap shot by Pittsburgh's Matt Cooke. Savard missed the rest of the regular season and opening round of the playoffs. He did return for the second round against Philadelphia but suffered a recurrence of post-concussion syndrome symptoms during the summer and missed training camp and the first 23 games of this season before returning on Dec. 2.
"He's a guy that I've built a good friendship and a relationship with in the four years that I've been here, and to see him go through this again, it's definitely tough to see him go through," Bruins forward Milan Lucic said. "We're going to miss him around here. He's a vocal guy, he's happy to be around the rink, and we just wish him all the best for a full recovery. That's the main part."
There is no timetable for Savard's return from this latest injury, and his teammates stressed that they just want to make sure that the center can life a healthy life before worrying about getting him back on the ice.
"It's tough to say with concussions, because you never know," Lucic said. "There's no real timeline. Even if you think it's a minor one, sometimes it gets dragged on a lot longer than you'd expect. We hope that we get to see him back this year, but you've got to think for his health No. 1, you've got to make sure he makes a full recovery and doesn't make a mistake in coming back too early and puts his life in jeopardy."
The Bruins have become accustomed to playing without key players in recent years, and will now have to make do without Savard again for the foreseeable future.
"Every team goes through some injuries, so I think it's a matter of us making sure we're ready to battle through without him like we did before and like we've done in past without [Patrice] Bergeron and those kind of guys," Julien said. "We've been through those kinds of situations before like every team does. It builds character. It gives guys opportunities. I think a team can grow even more from those situations if it's handled well and when a guy comes back you recognize that it's a bonus."
"We've been through it this year without Savvy, we went through it last year without him," Julien added. "So it's not like it's unfamiliar territory for us."
Julien was asked if he expected the club to bring up another forward from Providence after the All-Star break, as the Bruins don't have any healthy spare forwards on the roster at this point.
"Right now we've got 12 forwards," Julien said. "That will depend on management and the salary cap and all that stuff and whether it makes sense or not. That will be dealt with as we move on here, but as we're speaking here now, it's no."
